When Mohan Bhagwat, chief of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), declared that India should aspire not merely to superpower status but to become “Vishwaguru”– teacher of the world – he articulated a vision that demands serious critical scrutiny. This rhetoric, increasingly central to contemporary Indian nationalism, represents a peculiar form of supremacist discourse that claims for India a position of moral, spiritual, and civilisational superiority over other nations. What makes this formulation particularly striking is its divergence from the nationalist idioms of other major nations, which typically emphasise strength, prosperity, or influence rather than pedagogical authority over humanity itself.This column examines the historical, sociological, and psychological roots of this “Vishwaguru complex,” argues that it emerges from specific caste-based epistemologies, and demonstrates how such hyperbolic rhetoric functions as deliberate mystification in an era of measurable national decline.The uniqueness of supremacist pedagogyThe rhetoric of “becoming a superpower” or “Vishwaguru” is close to unique to India. No other country speaks of its future greatness with this level of certainty and theatricality. Established powers don’t advertise their ascent: the United States doesn’t run on promises of becoming a superpower – it already behaves like one. China avoids the language of impending supremacy and instead invests steadily in technology, industry, and global influence. Russia talks of restoring lost stature. Even ambitious economies like Brazil, South Korea, or Turkey don’t turn national pride into a public campaign of inevitable world leadership. In this sense, India stands alone. Its political class has converted the idea of superpower status into a collective fantasy and a mass pedagogical project.This boastfulness operates as a substitute for capability. Instead of proprietary technology, industrial depth, or strategic leverage, slogans perform the work of achievement. The fixation on future supremacy is less about aspiration than compensation: loud claims filling the vacuum left by institutional decay and developmental stagnation. Nations that genuinely shape the world rarely speak in this register; they demonstrate strength through action, not incantation. The countries that declare destiny most aggressively are usually the ones furthest from realising it.The slogan “Vishwaguru” is even more distinctive. American exceptionalism invokes power; Chinese nationalism invokes rejuvenation; Russian nationalism invokes restoration; even religious states like Iran or Saudi Arabia define themselves by regional authority or theological guardianship. Only India frames itself as the world’s teacher, the bearer of knowledge the rest of humanity supposedly lacks. This is not the language of partnership or even leadership – it is hierarchical, didactic, and civilisationally patronising. It positions India as the enlightened instructor and the world as its classroom.Such confidence does not arise in a vacuum. It draws from a social tradition built on knowledge monopoly and stratified authority: the Brahminical idea that wisdom flows downward from a self-appointed pinnacle. The modern claim to global tutelage is simply this logic scaled up. It is not confidence born of achievement but the inflation of a historical caste impulse onto the international stage.In that sense, India’s boasts are not just loud – they are structurally unique. The rest of the world speaks of power. Only here do we speak of destiny, mastery, and the world awaiting our instruction.Brahminical epistemologyThe ideological substratum that informs the RSS and wider Hindutva emerges from a specifically Brahminical epistemology grounded in the premise of congenital hierarchy. Within this framework, human inequality is not merely social but ontological: Brahmins are positioned as inherently superior by virtue of birth, endowed with a putatively greater proximity to sacred knowledge and spiritual authority. The caste system thus operated not as a neutral division of labour but as a division of human worth, naturalised through doctrines of ritual purity, karma, and rebirth that framed hierarchy as cosmic order rather than historical construction.Central to this structure was the consolidation of epistemic power. Access to sacred knowledge – most notably the Vedas – was institutionally monopolised by Brahmins, who alone possessed the authority to interpret, disseminate, or withhold it. Educational exclusion constituted a mechanism of control rather than mere deprivation: Shudras were legally and theologically barred from hearing Vedic recitation, with violence sanctioned to enforce these boundaries. The result was an epistemological regime in which the Brahmin became teacher by definition, while marginalised castes were structurally designated as non-knowers. Intellectual authority was grounded in claims of exclusive access to transcendence rather than demonstrable competence, producing what can be described as a supremacist epistemology stabilised through ritual, repetition, and punitive enforcement.The RSS inherits this genealogy. Founded by a Brahmin (K.B. Hedgewar), theoretically consolidated by a Brahmin ideologue (M.S. Golwalkar), and repeatedly led by Brahmin leadership thereafter, the organisation’s ideological production bears the marks of this ancestry. While its social base has broadened through strategic lower-caste mobilisation, its conceptual architecture remains Brahminical: the nation is imagined through hierarchical categories, cultural authority flows from the top down, and participation by subordinated groups occurs within frameworks they did not author.The “Vishwaguru” aspiration exemplifies this epistemic lineage. At the scale of the nation-state, it reproduces the Brahminical claim to pedagogical supremacy: India is positioned as the world’s teacher not on the basis of empirical achievement or reciprocal exchange, but as an entitlement grounded in civilisational self-description. This formulation presumes an asymmetrical relationship between India and the rest of the world – one in which India dispenses knowledge and others receive it, replicating at the geopolitical level the pedagogical hierarchy that structured caste society. In this sense, the Vishwaguru discourse is not an incidental slogan but the internationalisation of a domestic epistemology historically used to justify internal stratification.The paradox of inferiorityThe rhetoric of “Vishwaguru” exposes the opposite of what it seeks to project. Performative proclamations of pedagogical superiority signal not confidence but insecurity. Real authority does not require self-advertisement; it is inferred from demonstrable achievement. Likewise, states that actually shape the world system do not campaign as future superpowers – they act as such and let outcomes speak.The mechanism at work is compensatory grandiosity. Confronted with persistent developmental deficits – poor rankings in hunger, human development, gender equity, press freedom, and environmental performance – the response is to assert superiority in domains that are insulated from empirical verification. Claims of primacy in “spirituality,” “civilisation,” or “ancient wisdom” become a discursive refuge precisely because they cannot be objectively measured or contested; they shift evaluation from material capability to metaphysical assertion.This is a classic inferiority dynamic: overstatement of greatness in those very areas where present performance cannot sustain it. The more fragile India’s institutional and developmental standing becomes, the louder the proclamation of civilisational tutelage. Instead of contemporary innovation, the argument retreats into antiquity, attempting to convert historical memory into present authority. It is the politics of nostalgia deployed as a substitute for modern achievement.The logic is inverted: if India were already regarded as a source of global guidance, others would say so; the claim would not need to be shouted domestically. The insistence itself reveals the anxiety. “Vishwaguru” functions as aspirational rhetoric presented as fact, its repetition attempting to bridge the distance between desire and reality. The louder the assertion, the clearer the underlying uncertainty.Taken together, these insights suggest that the claim to global tutelage is less a statement of realised power than a symbolic strategy to mask the gap between aspirational identity and material reality – a rhetoric of superiority arising from conditions of deep structural insecurity.The reality of declineThe louder the rhetoric of “superpower” and “Vishwaguru,” the sharper India’s actual decline on measurable indicators. The contrast is stark. On hunger and nutrition, India ranks 102/127 on the Global Hunger Index 2025, with the world’s highest child wasting rate (≈19%). Children are starving while the state claims civilisational leadership. In education, ASER data shows a basic learning crisis – large numbers of children cannot read grade-level text or do simple arithmetic – and Indian universities remain globally uncompetitive. In healthcare, doctor-patient ratios fall below WHO norms, out-of-pocket spending drives millions into poverty, and the COVID-19 collapse exposed systemic incapacity.Gender inequality remains structural: India stands 131/148 on the Global Gender Gap Index 2025, with pervasive discrimination, high rates of sexual violence, and skewed sex ratios revealing ongoing female feticide. Press freedom has crumbled – 161/180 on the 2025 index – as arrests, intimidation, and violence against journalists, civil rights activists, scholars, intellectuals and students make a mockery of democratic self-praise. Environmental degradation is now existential: 13 of the 20 most polluted cities on earth are in India, air and water systems are collapsing, and climate impacts devastate the poor.Meanwhile, unemployment and inequality show the social cost of this model. Youth joblessness is entrenched, and the World Inequality Report (2026) notes that the top 1% controls ~40% of wealth; the bottom 50% survives on ~15% of national income. This is not growth but concentrated enrichment.This is only a snapshot, but the pattern is consistent: in domain after domain – hunger, health, education, gender, press freedom, environment, and inequality – India is not rising but regressing. The fantasy of becoming a global teacher functions as consolation for material decline; the louder the boast, the harsher the reality it conceals.The function of mystificationGiven this reality, what purpose does the “Vishwaguru” rhetoric serve? It functions as deliberate mystification – a discursive strategy to divert attention from material failure to abstract claims of superiority, from measurable indicators to unmeasurable assertions, from accountability for present governance to pride in distant past.This mystification operates through several mechanisms:Temporal displacement: By constantly invoking ancient achievements and future promise, attention is diverted from present failure. The conversation shifts from “why are children starving today?” to “remember our glorious past and imagine our inevitable future greatness.”Domain displacement: When confronted with material indicators of backwardness, the discourse shifts to “spiritual” or “cultural” superiority– domains where superiority is asserted rather than demonstrated, where evidence is anecdotal rather than statistical, where criticism can be dismissed as materialistic or Western.Emotional substitution: Pride replaces analysis, sentiment replaces thought. Citizens are encouraged to feel good about proclaimed national greatness rather than think critically about actual national conditions. This emotional satisfaction serves as a substitute for material improvement.Delegitimisation of critique: Perhaps most insidiously, this rhetoric frames any criticism of India’s actual conditions as attacks on India itself, as “anti-national” or “self-loathing.” If India is Vishwaguru, then questioning this claim becomes not merely disagreement but betrayal. This chills democratic discourse and insulates governance from accountability.The effect is to create a population that believes in its nation’s superiority despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that takes pride in proclaimed achievements while ignoring actual deprivations, that directs anger at critics rather than at the conditions being criticised. This is manufactured consent through manufactured delusion – and it is profoundly dangerous for democracy and development alike.Historical parallels, diplomatic costsHistory is full of powers that resorted to supremacist rhetoric precisely as their material position weakened. Late Qing China insisted on civilisational superiority even as it slipped into military humiliation. Japan’s language of divine destiny intensified in the 1930s while it marched toward catastrophic militarism. The Soviet Union proclaimed communist inevitability with greater urgency as systemic failure became impossible to hide. In every case, grandiose self-assertion masked decline, insulated rulers from accountability, and accelerated crisis.India now risks repeating this pattern. The slogans of “superpower” and “Vishwaguru” may be aimed at domestic audiences, but they carry international consequences. No nation – least of all those outperforming India on most developmental indicators– will accept civilisational tutelage from a state that ranks near the bottom in hunger, education, health, press freedom, and environmental performance. The diplomatic fallout is already visible: a neighbourhood that has drifted away, eroded regional influence, and a foreign policy without a stable anchor, swinging between great powers rather than shaping its own strategic environment. Loudness at home has translated into isolation abroad.The wider the gap between rhetoric and reality, the greater the vulnerability. Supremacist assertion in place of developmental achievement leads to strategic miscalculation, policy failure, and eventually social rupture when citizens can no longer ignore the disparity between national claims and lived conditions. The more India declares itself a teacher to the world, the more conspicuous becomes its failure to learn from history.Toward honest nationalismIndia’s self-perception as a historic “world leader” collapses under historical scrutiny. Even at its economic height under the Mughals – roughly 24–27% of global GDP – China remained the larger and more technologically advanced power. India’s wealth reflected demographic scale and internal markets rather than maritime reach, technological proprietorship, or geopolitical authority. Its intellectual achievements in mathematics, metallurgy, medicine, and philosophy were significant but not unparalleled; China, the Islamic world, and later Europe surpassed India in invention, bureaucracy, navigation, and military modernisation. At no point did Indian polities shape the global order or drive the international system. The notion of a past “Vishwaguru” role is retrospective nationalism, not historical reality.This is not to deny genuine achievements: ISRO’s cost-efficient missions, a globally competitive IT-services sector, and a still-functioning democratic framework are real strengths. But even here, India is not a leader in a strict sense. Space science relies on frugal engineering rather than frontier innovation; IT excels in outsourcing rather than foundational patents or operating systems; democracy endures more through residual institutional memory than institutional strength; cultural influence is broad but not agenda-setting. India is present and occasionally impressive, but rarely decisive. It neither owns key technologies nor sets global standards; it participates rather than defines.What India needs is not louder claims of civilisational primacy but an honest reckoning with developmental reality: hunger, unemployment, educational collapse, environmental crisis, democratic backsliding, and widening inequality. Progress demands abandoning the Brahminical epistemology that asserts authority without demonstrating it– claims to superior knowledge without empirical achievement, demands for deference without merit. A democratic polity cannot improve if critique is stigmatised, evidence dismissed, and sentiment elevated above accountability.The choice is stark. Persist in hyperbolic self-congratulation and the “Vishwaguru complex” will continue to mask decline and enable authoritarian drift. Or embrace the harder path of sober self-assessment, institutional reform, and developmental focus. Real national pride is earned through outcomes, not announced through slogans. A country that cannot teach its own children to read has no business proclaiming itself the world’s teacher.Until India confronts reality rather than myth, “Vishwaguru” or “superpower” will remain what it is: a compensatory fantasy, a rhetoric of superiority masking structural weakness, and an obstacle to the genuine development its citizens urgently require.Anand Teltumbde is former CEO of PIL, professor of IIT Kharagpur, and GIM, Goa. He is also a writer and civil rights activist.